Saturday, 31 March 2012

West Ham 2 Reading 4 - Wembley Here We Come!

I'm trying to be positive, I really am. But really, this has been coming hasn't it? Reading have been charging since their 3-0 thumping of us at the Madjeski, and we have been stuttering. First thirty minutes, there only looked to be one winner to be fair, and it wasn't Reading. But the SAMe old problem persists, plenty of possession but little or no guile. But with our midfield, is that any surprise?

So 1-0 after 9 minutes, giving Allardyce the early goal he had demanded and after that, little or no indication of a second, apart from a break away. How busy was Federici? Well idle to be honest. He made a great save to keep out Nolan's header but Cole scored from the rebound so that save doesn't count does it?

The vendetta being conducted against Kebe was stupid, giving Reading free kick after free kick and bringing them back into the game. Noble lost the ball that led to the corner from which Reading scored, and his critics will sadly be gleeful about that, but you should be able to defend a set piece, as Allardyce will tell you, and we didn't. But then with Harte taking them, you are always likely to ship a goal sooner or later. There's one other thing you don't do when Harte is on the field, concede a penalty; so we, of course, obliged there too.

The second Reading goal was an accident waiting to happen, that accident being Faubert. The guy isn't a full back. He's barely a winger to be honest but he most definitely isn't a full back! Play him at the back and it will cost you. Reading nearly scored when he failed to deal with one cross, Tomkins clearing off the line, and didn't shun a second opportunity presented by the dozy frog.

Now we come to half time and the substitution. So, you are 2-1 down and need to win the game and Noble can't come out for the second half. You have Lansbury on the bench. You have Maynard on the bench. You have Baldock on the bench. So what do you do? You send on Collins obviously! OK, strange, but if the idea is to move Faubert forward and Vaz Te inside, fair enough, an interesting tactical switch. But no. That's not Allardyce's plan. Far too progressive. Far too positive. Far too imaginative. No, we have shipped two goals so let's anchor the midfield properly, let's send Tomkins into midfield! Inspired! Truly, truly, truly inspired! Did anybody see that one coming?

And there you have the Allardyce mentality in a nutshell. there is why this man should not be managing our club. Look at his resources compared with those of McDermott. Why is the Reading man able to inspite his team to play without fear whilst our lot look as if they are perched on the edge of Tower Bridge wearing concrete boots as soon as anything starts to go against them.

Tell me, how was a midfield of O'Neil, Nolan, Tomkins, Taylor and Vaz Te going to create chances for Cole parked up top on his own? I bet McDermott couldn't believe his luck when he saw the substitution! Did it work, of course it didn't. Reading scored their third - and there can be no argument over the penalty stupidly conceded by Faye (with Foy ruling out a goal to award the spot kick!) - so Allardyce made another inspired decision, taking off Taylor and sending on Baldock. Brilliant, 4-4-2! But hang on, who was left in midfield? O'Neil, Tomkins, Nolan and Vaz Te! Tell me, how was that collection of misfits going to work? Who, exactly, was going to dictate the play from the middle of the park? Where was the creativity exactly? Two up top but nobody to get the ball up to them! Brilliant management, truly brilliant!

There was, of course, time for another switch, with Allardyce bringing on Maynard for Cole, only for the former Bristol City man to miss a sitter from inside the six yard box with the best chance enjoyed by either side in the whole game.

Vaz Te scored with a good header from an O'Neil corner; and a set piece was the only way we were going to score with that midfield wasn't it? The Reading fourth goal looked offside to me but so what? I can't see us catching them now so goal difference is unlikely to be a factor.

All week I've had a feeling in my water; sadly it's turned out to be a bladder infection. We can still get up via the playoffs but recent performances don't inspire do they? Sadly Peterborough won't feature!

19 comments:

As much as I absolutely despise Allardyce and his management style I'm not too sure sacking him will help. BECAUSE he has built that team to play his own (terrible) style of football. They are tailor made to him. If a new man comes in, they probably still won't play good football. Either way if we go up or stay down, Gold + Sullivan are gonna need to seriously replace about 13/14 of the team.

But hey, the only good thing now is that is in Reading's hands to throw away.

the sad thing is the loss is not a suprise,another little club come toour ground and mug us off.our useless arrogant fat fuck of a manager should get on his bakers bike and ride back to the cobbled streets of some northen conference side where he belongs.i wonder what the fans done wrong today?.its bound to be our fault..fatboy,get the fuck out of dodge...

Shows how wrong you can be cos I had that feeling this week too. After our dominant start Reading did what they've done all seson - grew and looked ultra dangerous on the break. It'll take something daft for them not to be top two now- got to hope that Brum and Saints can help us, bit in truth I think we needed at least a point today.

We're not going to agree on sacking Allardyce with a month to go though I know message boards will be rife with that talk now.

Onwards and upwards (hopefully). I ain't seen West Ham at Wembley since 1981 so I'm going to cling to that.

Off to drown my sorrows and do a match post mortem with a couple of mates who went. And no, I won't drown Sam at the say time :)

Nolan should be a 2 apart from the goal he did nothing all game. No tracking back caught out of position gave away the ball plenty of times and was the person who gave away the ball 10 yards outside his own area which they went on and scored from. Geez if you take off Noble over Nolan at half time then you are left with 9 men on the field because Noble does a souble shift of work every game because of Nolan

Sadly I have had a feeling in my water too. You castigate the midfield and ask where is the creativity, well I don't think Lansbury or indeed anyone else that we have would have made much difference. People go on about the strength of our squad but when the pressure is on it has proved itself wanting and really with something like 240 shots off target this season that says it all. The tactics may be mystifying and the style turgid but the chances have been created; our forwards just haven't scored often enough. our midfielders have scored more often than our forwards and they have been especially profligate at home, which is where the real problem lies. Some called for Hall, Morrison and others to be unleashed, maybe so, but it would be an enormous roll of the dice; even if it doesn't work out this season was never about expansive gambles but learning how to win again- however it is done. Trouble is there is no guarantee that another manager would have piloted the team out of sight by now.. Only six teams have bounced straight back in the last 40 years or so and our squad just isn't good enough.As unpalatable as it may seem if we do it will be because of Sam's chosen safety first percentage game.

We started strong but we couldn't score a second goal and began to give away silly freekicks. Then came the equalizer and a minute later Reading's lead. Although I think Faubert was a bit unlucky when he "passed" the ball to Hunt. The second half wasn't any better, we barely tested Federici, apart from Vaz Te's headed goal and Maynards header and BSF showed his tactical genius once more.BFS will point out we had more posession and more shorts on goal but who cares ? It's almost for sure the automatic promotion ship has sailed, so now we have to focus on the remaining fixtures and the playoff matches.

I mean...hey, let's look on the bright side...we won't have to play against Reading or Southampton in the playoffs!

a new manager could come in now and make an instant impact some one like bruce sack fat man now get someone in with the rest of the season as a trial i think we have some good players we just need a manager with a bit of attack in there mind even curbs has gotta be better than fat man we have nothing to lose as we dont even look capable of winning the playoffs with fat guts in charge gold and sullivan have grounds to sack the fat cnut now with out compensation due to his outbursts angainst the fans the dildo brothers are westham fans so they say well fat prick allardyce must mean them aswell so theres the grounds to sack him

Absolutely correct Kevin in Manchjester - our squad ISN't good enough. Fact is, our points come from Allardyce getting the team top defend better than they have done for a good few years now. But attacking - no way. The midfield - laughable. WAY TOO SLOW, and so predictable.

Cue all the deluded ones banging on about 'we should walk this league etc etc' and 'little teams come here and beat us' etc etc. Wake up and take a good look at mediocrities like Noble, Collison etc, and don't forget the unlamented [by me] 'legend' Scott Parker. Another mediocrity who for some reason became 'Mr West Ham'. If he plays the West Ham way, you can stick that. No skill, no guile, no control of the ball [take a bow C. Cole]. And seriously,Baldock & maynard in the PL ? Ho ho.

I understand the concern of those that DON'T want Allardyce to be sacked,because like someone said above, Fat Sam has built the team in his way. But then again,with 6 games left,we will definitely have to be in the playoffs,we need like 12 points by my calculations. I think it could be beneficial to have a new gaffer for those games,because I hardly believe Fat Sam can win us those games. But by the looks of it, I don't think Gold and Sullivan would wanna sack him just yet. They will eventually,should we fail to achieve promotion. Also,I think the players are also to blame for our misfortunes,equally coz they can't create,they can't hold up the ball,they have no vision or flair. Like half of them are a bunch of has-beens. We need to get rid of dead weight.

Just a Reading fan commenting to say thanks Sam for gifting us the three points.West Ham fans need to take a good look at themselves...disgusting how many of them left before the end...saw some leave at 3-1...if you want your team to do well...stick with them and support them.

Kevin in Manchester is right. We saw it again today just like Doncaster for example- we should have been clear but don't quite have the quality to do it. You can say we've got the highest paid squad in the league but most of that is down to an awful squad put together when we were in the Premiership as far back as Pardew and Curbishley. Just one example - Piquionne is on just under £2 million a year ffs.

If you're in the Championship you get in championship players- if they're any better than that they stay where they are or go to the top league. So you end up with at best, ageing, past their prime tryers like Diop, McCartney, Taylor and Nolan who if they really were part of a squad that was a class above this league, simply would not have been let go by their Premiership clubs in the first place.

Blame Allardyce for that? No still can't do that. He inherited shite and had to bring in what he could and they were never going to be players that even the likes QPR, Bolton or Wolves would have considered cos they are a league above us.

Depending on your view he may be a bad manager, a decent one or an average one but Allardyce never had enough money to buy style. However he he has still bought organisation to the team- 8 defeats in 40 games, so he obviously isn't utter crap. That makes us the hardest to beat West Ham team in 30 years.

All is not lost re: going up, but as I said the other day unfortunately he has his enemies paint himself into a corner where now sadly he is a dead man walking. Shame- cos whoever ends up here next will be an utter gamble. And yes of course include PDC in that.

PS- whoever said Bruce- I just hope that was a sick joke on your part cos if you don't like Allardyce you certainly won't like that miserable, average non-entity. You may be too young to remember but that man has a history with West Ham far worse than Allardyce's. If you're not too young that last bit shouldn't even need saying.

Absolutely right 19:38 RE Scott Parker, Noble and Collison. The reason I think the likes of these midfielders get so much praise from fans is that there is a lack of knowledge in England as to what the role of a midfielder is.

Moving on to Allardyce, this is probably the best attempt I have seen by Allardyce to play football this season. Obviously it was still fairly dower but when you see most of the dross we've served up this season this felt like watching Barca for 40 minutes. Allardyce's argument is look what the West Ham way brought us last season. The response to such a stupid argument is that that was not the West Ham way. The West Ham way has not been seen over a consistent period of time since the days of Pardew. The way that Allardyce sniggers when asked about not playing the West Ham way makes me sick. This ignorant, arrogant, northen c+nt has no respect for the traditions of this club. He doesn't understand that we are not some regional northen team with no tradition and uneducated fans that will sit through any old sh!te as long as the team wins a few games. We are West Ham Utd. We are the club that produced the backbone of the World Cup winning England team. We are the club that used to be everybody's second team. I used to be proud of that. We may not of had much money so we couldn't really win many trophies but at least we enjoyed watching our team. This season has sapped most of the joy from football for me and I am sure many others feel the same. I really can not wait until this season ends now and even if we go up as champions I want Allardyce sacked and Di Canio in. I know that sounds like a stupid and far too risky idea but to be honest I think it is his destiny to become West Ham manager and succeed so why not get the success train up and running sooner rather than later? At lest he would bring to back to this club what football is about: Entertainment!!! Contrary to popular belief football is not about life and death it is about people paying to watch there team and expecting an adequate return of entertainment for the money they have payed. So never mind kids for a quid Gulivan, bring back the entertainment!!!

From Tom

Hammersfan, I am a British soldier ... just home from the winter in Afghan, I was at the Boro cup game where my boy took a half time penalty during my leave ...

I love your blogs .... keep em coming .. its great fun and I love all the saddo's that criticise you ... free country, freedom of speech ... we all have a choice n all that ... well if you don't like .... read the Sun ..

(Cheers Tom, an endorsement like that would outweigh 15 million idiots wanting to close this site down.)

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